The Hinge

i saw myself
standing in the grocery line of my own life

hands full of things
i did not choose

no one tells you
how quietly it happens

how you keep saying yes
until your hands forget
what no —feels like

i watched myself swallow it—a bird

not the kind they print on curtains

but the ragged one
ink-splattered
off balance

with a wing
that can’t decide
if it is breaking
or beginning

i say bird
you say anxiety
the doctor says reflux
my mother says pray

my body says:
listen

behind the sternum
that almost-ache
that isn’t pain

that drop in the gut, that sudden remembering
you are alive

and not
where you thought
you would be

i have become
a species of almost-flight

i negotiate with gravity
in quiet rooms
and call it duty

some call it love
some call it
be reasonable

i have learned
the choreography of staying

how to smile
while something in me
paces

i saw a woman
that woman was me

setting a table for ghosts

one plate for my father

one for each son
in their uniform of distance

their chairs pulled out
but empty

and one
for the self
that slips out the back door
when no one is looking

she pours water
for all of them

her hands don’t shake

she does not drink

the bird in her chest
has feathers made of memory
a beak made of unfinished sentences

its claws
hook into the soft places
where decisions live

and the world keeps saying
be calm
be grateful

while the sky
indecent in its openness
says nothing

i ask it for instructions

it gives me none

only this:

witness

the bird does not die
when ignored

it grows patient
it grows precise
it learns your habits

it learns
how long you can stand yourself

and waits

for the moment
you mistake silence
for peace

and then

it moves

not loud
not dramatic

just enough
to ruin the lie

i am not telling you to leave

i am telling you to notice
the exact second
your breath changes

the pause
before you explain it away

the shift
you pretend not to feel

that . .

that is the hinge

that is where your life
opens

or stays closed

you are not broken

you are over-kept
over-held
over-explained

you are wings
taught to apologize for air

so stand there

in your kitchen
in your car
in the long corridor
of your thoughts

stand there
and feel it

the press
the pulse
the almost

the part of you
that still wants more
even now

call it bird
if your want

call it hunger

call it the refusal
to live
half a life